I was just checking whether Brit lawyers hit the same problems as American. I know quite often we've seen lawyers posting here but stating that it's not official legal advice and if you want that, go to a locally licensed lawyer, so as to avoid them becoming liable for their advice.
Not quite sure where you got Kent from (though you're right). Freaky...
Actually, it's a 250 mile _round_trip_. North would still be middle of nowhere (though nearer somewhere), east would still be in a language I can't speak and south - erm, south might actually get me wet feet. I'd need to check how wide the channel is at that point....
I'm going basically west though. Nice and safe. And no, people aren't getting more info out of me than that:)
Thanks. Very helpful. Especially the last point -they'd have a hard time winning it I'd suspect but I don't particularly want to have to fight it out in court...
One quick thing - I assume that isn't official legal advice from you, just to cover you in case of someone getting shirty?
I'm jobhunting at the moment, too. I've only just graduated (in CS) so I really can't see anything like this coming up as I wouldn't be going senior enough, but...
Quick reminder - I'm in the UK here.
Let's say that an interviewer slaps an NDA in front of me, demanding I sign it before going any further. What would people suggest I do? A blanket answer either way doesn't seem to clever, so what guidelines for when to sign and when not to would people suggest?
(quick, cheeky aside - got through my link and you'll see a button labelled CV. If anyone wants to offer me work...)
Ex-Palm user here. I moved because I realised I needed a keyboard (I was having to work on large documents too often for graffiti to be practical) but I have to say I wouldn't move back now. The system's just better. More powerful, more flexible. Also makes me realise how small the screen is on a Palm:)
I can't comment too directly on the apps as my machine's fairly old (original S5) but they're still pretty good. Yes, there are some things I miss, but not many.
If you get a chance, try one. Yes, they're a little larger. But I have to say the extra size is worth it. You get a better machine which made me realise just how compromised - and, in some ways, downright _cheap_ - the Palms are.
If they're developing and licensing it themselves but are committed to going for an open license then yes, the GPL is probably better. Big 'if', though.
What we're talking about here is a pre-existing program which they want to use and which happens to be under an open license.
As it's GPL with Linux, they have to release all their modifications and make the code available. Reduces the chances of them managing a USP.
If we were talking BSD they'd be under no obligation to do anything. They can use it pretty much as they please and don't have to distribute their stuff as anything other than binary.
TBH, once the first few games have come out, there's not a lot that can be done which doesn't draw from _something_. There's now simply too big a pool of software out there.
As with Dungeon Keeper then yes, I see your point:) It rather illustrates what I'm saying, though - a brilliant game, looks very much its own new idea, but can be argued is drawn from others to some degree...
That might be a (loose) specification, it might be a partial prototype. If that's what you'd think of as a design then I'd rather not work with you if that's OK.
Design needs to be many things which that simply cannot be. It needs to go over the requirements that have been established and properly sort out what needs to be done to sort these out. The structure needs working out, the interfaces need specification. If all you have is a vague description of the issue and a code fragment you really can't expect to sort out the design with any serious chance of success. After a while of designing the system that way you can expect to hit problems as what is a fundamental feature of one component's implementation may become a block to another working. Whereas if it's been properly designed and analysed the chance of this happening is substantially lower.
The other side is that, when it comes to maintaining the software, your approach to design means there's no concrete explanation of exactly why something does what it does - or even what's there. By forcing the maintainers to work out the code with no substantial, clear documentation to explain what's going on, you end up with a much larger effort and a lower probability of success as the maintainers aren't necessarily going to pick up on the subtelties. After all, look back at code you wrote a while back. How well can you understand it at first reading, undocumented? And you wrote it.
You _really_ need more documentation and design than that if you're going to do a seriously good job, long-term.
The one I remember particularly was when a system menu appeared and was mostly off the side of the screen...
From the assesment I made - short and superficial, by my own admission - it's difficult to determine that much about either. Fundamentally, they both appeared relatively strong. Obviously some things niggled - not enough keyboard shortcus, in particular - but the main thing which struck me was that KDE felt like a proper product whereas GNOME felt like the tech people just wanted to play with their code and hadn't then bothered to do the dull checking.
It wasn't clearly a bad product, it just smacked of a poor development culture. No sign that they'd bothered to go over it and put in the spit and polish. Which, TBH, makes me wonder if there might be other things they've decided are unnecessary frills, like proper specification or design...
... or maybe the big boys didn't want to get burnt by the licensing issues that make KDE possibly illegal to distribute.
I'll freely admit here that I use Windows on my main box, and don't currently have a Linux setup. That's changing soon, but I don't have the time or resources to do it yet.
However, back when I was at university earlier this year, my department had one lab full of Linux bixes. So, I played. For a while in KDE, then for a while in GNOME.
GNOME shocked me. Menus appearing in the wrong places and a dreadful taskbar implementation are the two things that stick in my mind.
Speaking as an educated (but, in this respect, novice) user, KDE won hands down. It just worked better and was always clear and logical. GNOME annoyed me and showed little evidence of people caring that much about the user experience.
Note that this is a quick sample from a few months ago and that I have no idea what versions I was using. Based on that evidence, though, KDE absolutely walloped GNOME. If it was still like that, I wouldn't even think twice. Hence my wonder whether the main motivation is that GNOME is plausible and definitely legal, rather than that they think it's better.
Re:PC is hardly dead - but it may not be very well
on
Vanishing Game Genres
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· Score: 2
I'd dispute the suggestion that Wolfenstein 3D was truly original. Plenty of RPGs had used a first-person viewpoint while wandering round a maze before, while the gameplay wasn't really more than a gauntlet clone. Viewpoint alone does not a new genre make.
Looking across at my shelf, I'd have to suggest the inclusion of Dungeon Keeper, though. It'd seem just as original as Lemmings to me.
These things may not have sold well before, but with one of those babys inside it...
I remember one of the UK PC mags - PCW IIRC - going mad over this when it first apeared, and I can see why. It's just so _cute_, that size and with that camera. I was sorely tempted when I saw a 233 model going for UKP900 a while back, but managed to be good:)
I've just got a Psion 5. Lovely machine, not without its problems - but neither was my Palm III. Gave up on that because I realised I needed a keyboard.
Now. A Psion 5 is already too big for a pocket. This isn't much bigger - certainly no bigger than an LG Phenom Express. Except it's got a 1024*480 colour screen rather than my Psion's 640*240 16 greyscale. It can run Windows so I don't have such a limited software range. And, with this chip, it'll now run all day.
Yes, it's heavier. Yes, it's more fragile. Yes, it's more expensive and yes, it won't power up instantly. But let's be honest here. If we're sensible with the install, Windows will still boot within 30 seconds, which is good enough nost of the time. It'll also be a lot faster. And you still have to be careful with PDAs. I cracked my Palm III's screen, for example...
They're not as stupid as they look, releasing it first in one of these. Were I a little richer, I'd look at one.
Re:Distributed online voting perhaps?
on
BSD And Politics
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· Score: 2
Or
d) Stop ballots. If you can (somehow) get at the boxes between the polling stgation and the counters, you can disrupt it that way.
OTOH, you don't necessarily have to go to this sort of trouble. The percentage of the population who actually know what the issues and positions are on pretty much anything is _tiny_. Over here, there's been several surveys showing both a public demand for longer prison sentences and a severe underestimation of what sentences were actually handed out. Go figure...
If you have a reasonable amount of power, the easiest thing to do is to get misinformation out into the halfway trusted mass-market newspapers. In the UK, say the Labour party want to put up taxes lots to make prisons more comfortable and give all new entrants to this country triple benefits. Or the Tories want to, erm, make all education private? Actually, it's getting pretty difficult to come up with something implausibly extreme for Hague to say, he's gone so far right;) Or that the LibDems (who you'd have to be pretty paranoid to smear at a national level) wanted to rush the UK into a European superstate with no more sovereignty than a US state.
Let's jump the pond. Bush could say that Gore wants to drastically reduce the size of the military, or Gore that Bush wanted to remove all social protection legislation. Whoops, probably a little close to the bone there, too...
Anyway, you get the idea. Once you have any degree of media influence, by far the most effective way to disrupt an election is to affect the casting of votes by getting the public to believe utter rubbish. It's rather sad quite to what extent some trust the media:(
Re:Why doesn't Warner Brothers sue the MPAA?
on
NYT On DeCSS Case
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· Score: 2
Two I can remember off the top of my head that came out _very_ early in the format's life:
Naked Gun 2 1/2 Star Trek... er... 6 I think.
The liked the idea of cheaper manufacturing. CDs cost pennies, but video cassettes are a pain to make. Moving parts, after all.
It never really took off in this country (UK) but they tried.
There's nothing that says all Linux software has to be open-source. Flaming anyone who releases closed-source Linux software is just counterproductive and stops mainstream adoptation. And this is coming from a non-fan...
Besides, it's not even _necessary_ here. The better way to handle that is a plugin module, library, whatever. Much more elegant and no need for completely open source.
I suspect, when you get to see it, that'll be how id have implemented that. Most sensible way, IMO.
I've got a Palm III where the glass screen cover is cracked. The LCD's fine, but the digister won't work because the glass is gone.
How'd this happen? Fall of maybe 3Com onto lino, out of a pocket. I can't believe 3Com never thought that sort of thing would happen when they designed it...
What it really makes me wonder, though, is why use glass? Surely perspex would be lighter, just as rigid yet less fragile? And scratching isn't an issue as there's a separate screen protector on top of the glass anyway... Or, for that matter, why design the glass and LCD to be totally inseparable. Makes it a non-economic repair and absolutely guarantees I'm leaving PalmOS.
It's getting replaced with a Psion 5. Bigger screen, easier data entry - I just got sick of having to do too much in Graffiti. And, from what I can see, no glass in that screen.
I can't say I see that my personal freedom is being restricted by such a practice. I can still easily access the games.
What this does is make it easier for the kids to be kept out and stopped from seeing these games running in passing. If you _honestly_ think that all parents will stop all kids under 15 (for example) from any contact with these games, you're sadly deluded.
It's appropriate to stop kids playing the wrong sort of games. I regard Grand Theft Auto as a wonderful fun multiplayer game, but there's no way I'd let kids play. Its potential to warp minds is clear. Not sure I'd let them play most FPS games either - too realistic. Sure, I grew up regularly shooting things, but in a _very_ cartoon fasion. The Chaos Engine is still one of my favourite games but it's far tamer than (for example) Sin. I can't shoot a guy's leg off in it, I'm just destroying monsters, quickly. They don't splatter blood, they don't collapse to the floor and stagger around. The divorce from reality is so much clearer.
Over here we've had games with age certificates on them for ages. Some have been more scapegoats than anything else, but most are fair and reasonable. And Soldier of Fortune got an 18 certificate.
I'm not so imperssed with the tech, personally. None of the hybrids are really that hot yet, so you're buying partly for the car geek factor. To me, the Insight has more than the Toyota Prius - the car you appear to mean. The Previa's an 8-seater MPV...
Part of it though, I'll freely admit, is that Toyota's cars are mostly rather dull. Nice sports models, but the Corolla and the like are _so_ dull. I just prefer Hondas as a range.
Something hugely scary I saw in an article recently - an 1000BHP Skyline R33. Turned up in a 0-100-0 test and went off the line without clouds of smoke from its tyres... No, they weren't sure how, either. Pulled 0-60 in 3.68 secs, 0-100 in 6.93. Accelerating so hard that the reaction time for the brakes spoiled it a bit, though - that turne d out at 1.79, for a total of 12.74.
Slashdot Mirror
I was just checking whether Brit lawyers hit the same problems as American. I know quite often we've seen lawyers posting here but stating that it's not official legal advice and if you want that, go to a locally licensed lawyer, so as to avoid them becoming liable for their advice.
:)
Anyway. As long as you're happy
Not quite sure where you got Kent from (though you're right). Freaky...
:)
Actually, it's a 250 mile _round_trip_. North would still be middle of nowhere (though nearer somewhere), east would still be in a language I can't speak and south - erm, south might actually get me wet feet. I'd need to check how wide the channel is at that point....
I'm going basically west though. Nice and safe. And no, people aren't getting more info out of me than that
Thanks. Very helpful. Especially the last point -they'd have a hard time winning it I'd suspect but I don't particularly want to have to fight it out in court...
One quick thing - I assume that isn't official legal advice from you, just to cover you in case of someone getting shirty?
Slight problem - it's a 250 mile round trip for this interview... I can definitely use the first one, though.
:)
:)
Maybe I take my phone with me, with the lawyer's number programmed into it
Thanks for the suggestions from all in this thread who I haven't personally replied to, though. Reaffirms my faith in Slashdot
Hi all!
I'm jobhunting at the moment, too. I've only just graduated (in CS) so I really can't see anything like this coming up as I wouldn't be going senior enough, but...
Quick reminder - I'm in the UK here.
Let's say that an interviewer slaps an NDA in front of me, demanding I sign it before going any further. What would people suggest I do? A blanket answer either way doesn't seem to clever, so what guidelines for when to sign and when not to would people suggest?
(quick, cheeky aside - got through my link and you'll see a button labelled CV. If anyone wants to offer me work...)
Thanks,
You what?
We've got one, as I understand, at Douneray in Scotland. It doesn't run anywhere near as cheaply as it should, and produces more waste.
Then, as with all things Nuclear, the decommisioning cost when it finally has to go is phenomenal.
Forget nuclear power. It's just a bad idea. And radiation isn't the only reason.
Ever tried a Psion?
:)
Ex-Palm user here. I moved because I realised I needed a keyboard (I was having to work on large documents too often for graffiti to be practical) but I have to say I wouldn't move back now. The system's just better. More powerful, more flexible. Also makes me realise how small the screen is on a Palm
I can't comment too directly on the apps as my machine's fairly old (original S5) but they're still pretty good. Yes, there are some things I miss, but not many.
If you get a chance, try one. Yes, they're a little larger. But I have to say the extra size is worth it. You get a better machine which made me realise just how compromised - and, in some ways, downright _cheap_ - the Palms are.
Ahh, you miss the point here.
If they're developing and licensing it themselves but are committed to going for an open license then yes, the GPL is probably better. Big 'if', though.
What we're talking about here is a pre-existing program which they want to use and which happens to be under an open license.
As it's GPL with Linux, they have to release all their modifications and make the code available. Reduces the chances of them managing a USP.
If we were talking BSD they'd be under no obligation to do anything. They can use it pretty much as they please and don't have to distribute their stuff as anything other than binary.
TBH, once the first few games have come out, there's not a lot that can be done which doesn't draw from _something_. There's now simply too big a pool of software out there.
:) It rather illustrates what I'm saying, though - a brilliant game, looks very much its own new idea, but can be argued is drawn from others to some degree...
As with Dungeon Keeper then yes, I see your point
Sorry, no.
That might be a (loose) specification, it might be a partial prototype. If that's what you'd think of as a design then I'd rather not work with you if that's OK.
Design needs to be many things which that simply cannot be. It needs to go over the requirements that have been established and properly sort out what needs to be done to sort these out. The structure needs working out, the interfaces need specification. If all you have is a vague description of the issue and a code fragment you really can't expect to sort out the design with any serious chance of success. After a while of designing the system that way you can expect to hit problems as what is a fundamental feature of one component's implementation may become a block to another working. Whereas if it's been properly designed and analysed the chance of this happening is substantially lower.
The other side is that, when it comes to maintaining the software, your approach to design means there's no concrete explanation of exactly why something does what it does - or even what's there. By forcing the maintainers to work out the code with no substantial, clear documentation to explain what's going on, you end up with a much larger effort and a lower probability of success as the maintainers aren't necessarily going to pick up on the subtelties. After all, look back at code you wrote a while back. How well can you understand it at first reading, undocumented? And you wrote it.
You _really_ need more documentation and design than that if you're going to do a seriously good job, long-term.
The one I remember particularly was when a system menu appeared and was mostly off the side of the screen...
From the assesment I made - short and superficial, by my own admission - it's difficult to determine that much about either. Fundamentally, they both appeared relatively strong. Obviously some things niggled - not enough keyboard shortcus, in particular - but the main thing which struck me was that KDE felt like a proper product whereas GNOME felt like the tech people just wanted to play with their code and hadn't then bothered to do the dull checking.
It wasn't clearly a bad product, it just smacked of a poor development culture. No sign that they'd bothered to go over it and put in the spit and polish. Which, TBH, makes me wonder if there might be other things they've decided are unnecessary frills, like proper specification or design...
... or maybe the big boys didn't want to get burnt by the licensing issues that make KDE possibly illegal to distribute.
I'll freely admit here that I use Windows on my main box, and don't currently have a Linux setup. That's changing soon, but I don't have the time or resources to do it yet.
However, back when I was at university earlier this year, my department had one lab full of Linux bixes. So, I played. For a while in KDE, then for a while in GNOME.
GNOME shocked me. Menus appearing in the wrong places and a dreadful taskbar implementation are the two things that stick in my mind.
Speaking as an educated (but, in this respect, novice) user, KDE won hands down. It just worked better and was always clear and logical. GNOME annoyed me and showed little evidence of people caring that much about the user experience.
Note that this is a quick sample from a few months ago and that I have no idea what versions I was using. Based on that evidence, though, KDE absolutely walloped GNOME. If it was still like that, I wouldn't even think twice. Hence my wonder whether the main motivation is that GNOME is plausible and definitely legal, rather than that they think it's better.
I'd dispute the suggestion that Wolfenstein 3D was truly original. Plenty of RPGs had used a first-person viewpoint while wandering round a maze before, while the gameplay wasn't really more than a gauntlet clone. Viewpoint alone does not a new genre make.
Looking across at my shelf, I'd have to suggest the inclusion of Dungeon Keeper, though. It'd seem just as original as Lemmings to me.
These things may not have sold well before, but with one of those babys inside it...
:)
I remember one of the UK PC mags - PCW IIRC - going mad over this when it first apeared, and I can see why. It's just so _cute_, that size and with that camera. I was sorely tempted when I saw a 233 model going for UKP900 a while back, but managed to be good
I've just got a Psion 5. Lovely machine, not without its problems - but neither was my Palm III. Gave up on that because I realised I needed a keyboard.
Now. A Psion 5 is already too big for a pocket. This isn't much bigger - certainly no bigger than an LG Phenom Express. Except it's got a 1024*480 colour screen rather than my Psion's 640*240 16 greyscale. It can run Windows so I don't have such a limited software range. And, with this chip, it'll now run all day.
Yes, it's heavier. Yes, it's more fragile. Yes, it's more expensive and yes, it won't power up instantly. But let's be honest here. If we're sensible with the install, Windows will still boot within 30 seconds, which is good enough nost of the time. It'll also be a lot faster. And you still have to be careful with PDAs. I cracked my Palm III's screen, for example...
They're not as stupid as they look, releasing it first in one of these. Were I a little richer, I'd look at one.
Or
;) Or that the LibDems (who you'd have to be pretty paranoid to smear at a national level) wanted to rush the UK into a European superstate with no more sovereignty than a US state.
:(
d) Stop ballots. If you can (somehow) get at the boxes between the polling stgation and the counters, you can disrupt it that way.
OTOH, you don't necessarily have to go to this sort of trouble. The percentage of the population who actually know what the issues and positions are on pretty much anything is _tiny_. Over here, there's been several surveys showing both a public demand for longer prison sentences and a severe underestimation of what sentences were actually handed out. Go figure...
If you have a reasonable amount of power, the easiest thing to do is to get misinformation out into the halfway trusted mass-market newspapers. In the UK, say the Labour party want to put up taxes lots to make prisons more comfortable and give all new entrants to this country triple benefits. Or the Tories want to, erm, make all education private? Actually, it's getting pretty difficult to come up with something implausibly extreme for Hague to say, he's gone so far right
Let's jump the pond. Bush could say that Gore wants to drastically reduce the size of the military, or Gore that Bush wanted to remove all social protection legislation. Whoops, probably a little close to the bone there, too...
Anyway, you get the idea. Once you have any degree of media influence, by far the most effective way to disrupt an election is to affect the casting of votes by getting the public to believe utter rubbish. It's rather sad quite to what extent some trust the media
Two I can remember off the top of my head that came out _very_ early in the format's life:
... er... 6 I think.
Naked Gun 2 1/2
Star Trek
The liked the idea of cheaper manufacturing. CDs cost pennies, but video cassettes are a pain to make. Moving parts, after all.
It never really took off in this country (UK) but they tried.
I've just checked and I can't get through to either site.
So, IP addresses anyone who can? Or descriptions?
Thanks,
Oh, come on. Don't be daft.
There's nothing that says all Linux software has to be open-source. Flaming anyone who releases closed-source Linux software is just counterproductive and stops mainstream adoptation. And this is coming from a non-fan...
Besides, it's not even _necessary_ here. The better way to handle that is a plugin module, library, whatever. Much more elegant and no need for completely open source.
I suspect, when you get to see it, that'll be how id have implemented that. Most sensible way, IMO.
Don Knuth is the CS guy.
Don Bluth is the guy who did Dragon's Lair.
I've got a Palm III where the glass screen cover is cracked. The LCD's fine, but the digister won't work because the glass is gone.
How'd this happen? Fall of maybe 3Com onto lino, out of a pocket. I can't believe 3Com never thought that sort of thing would happen when they designed it...
What it really makes me wonder, though, is why use glass? Surely perspex would be lighter, just as rigid yet less fragile? And scratching isn't an issue as there's a separate screen protector on top of the glass anyway... Or, for that matter, why design the glass and LCD to be totally inseparable. Makes it a non-economic repair and absolutely guarantees I'm leaving PalmOS.
It's getting replaced with a Psion 5. Bigger screen, easier data entry - I just got sick of having to do too much in Graffiti. And, from what I can see, no glass in that screen.
Sorry, I just can't see that sticking the games behind a curtain is a sufficiently significant restriction. I guess we'll have to differ here.
The point, from my POV, is that the restriction is trifling but it helps stop corrupting kids. Seems a good idea IMO.
I can't say I see that my personal freedom is being restricted by such a practice. I can still easily access the games.
What this does is make it easier for the kids to be kept out and stopped from seeing these games running in passing. If you _honestly_ think that all parents will stop all kids under 15 (for example) from any contact with these games, you're sadly deluded.
It's appropriate to stop kids playing the wrong sort of games. I regard Grand Theft Auto as a wonderful fun multiplayer game, but there's no way I'd let kids play. Its potential to warp minds is clear. Not sure I'd let them play most FPS games either - too realistic. Sure, I grew up regularly shooting things, but in a _very_ cartoon fasion. The Chaos Engine is still one of my favourite games but it's far tamer than (for example) Sin. I can't shoot a guy's leg off in it, I'm just destroying monsters, quickly. They don't splatter blood, they don't collapse to the floor and stagger around. The divorce from reality is so much clearer.
Over here we've had games with age certificates on them for ages. Some have been more scapegoats than anything else, but most are fair and reasonable. And Soldier of Fortune got an 18 certificate.
I'm not so imperssed with the tech, personally. None of the hybrids are really that hot yet, so you're buying partly for the car geek factor. To me, the Insight has more than the Toyota Prius - the car you appear to mean. The Previa's an 8-seater MPV...
Part of it though, I'll freely admit, is that Toyota's cars are mostly rather dull. Nice sports models, but the Corolla and the like are _so_ dull. I just prefer Hondas as a range.
Ahhh. Pretty heavily modded, then :)
Enjoy!
Something hugely scary I saw in an article recently - an 1000BHP Skyline R33. Turned up in a 0-100-0 test and went off the line without clouds of smoke from its tyres... No, they weren't sure how, either. Pulled 0-60 in 3.68 secs, 0-100 in 6.93. Accelerating so hard that the reaction time for the brakes spoiled it a bit, though - that turne d out at 1.79, for a total of 12.74.
And which MR2 would that be, sir?
Old 2.0 GT - 7.9 sec
New 1.8 - 7.3 sec (it's a lot lighter, in case anyone's wondering)
Old Turbo - 6.0 sec
What's been done to yours, then?